For the first time, two YouTube creators dominated a major film weekend. And the system that produced them is poised to spawn many more.
HOLLYWOOD, CALIFORNIA: The Hollywood sign is shrouded in smoke. (Photo: AaronP/Bauer-Griffin/GC Images)
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This weekend, two films made by directors in their twenties who built their audiences on YouTube accomplished something Hollywood had been reluctant to acknowledge: They surpassed Star Wars.
«"Backrooms" , A24's atmospheric horror film directed by 20-year-old Kain Parsons, grossed $81.4 million domestically and $118 million worldwide in its opening weekend. It's the biggest opening weekend in A24 history, more than tripling the previous record of $25.5 million set by Alex Garland's film. «"Civil war"» . It's also the biggest opening ever for an original film from a debut director, making Parsons the youngest director ever to top the box office.
He's twenty years old. He created this property as a creepypasta series on YouTube before he was even legally allowed to rent a car. It stars Chiwetel Ejiofor and Renate Reinswe.
«Obsession» — an independent horror film from 26-year-old writer-director Curry Barker — achieved an even rarer feat. In its third weekend, the film's box office grew another 10 percent, reaching $26.4 million, making it the first film outside the Christmas season to do so since «"The Extra-Terrestrial"» in 1982, which had higher box office receipts in its second and third weekends than its first. Its domestic total now stands at $104.7 million. Its worldwide gross is $148 million. It is the highest-grossing film in Focus Features history.
The production budget was $750,000. The return on production costs is approximately 200 times.
Together, "Behind the Scenes" and "Obsession" took first and second place at the weekend box office. «Disney's The Mandalorian and Grogu» , a $165 million Star Wars feature film, came in third with $24 million. Behind the Scenes' $81.4 million opening weekend alone matched The Mandalorian's entire opening weekend gross the previous week. Before filming Obsession, Curry Barker directed a short film called «Milk and Serial» on a Sony camcorder for $800. He distributed it on YouTube. It was this short film on YouTube that helped him meet with producers and create "Obsession.".
Romantic comedy in France «Two Sleepy Men» , created by digital content creators for approximately $100,000 in 100 days, was acquired by mk2 alt, the alternative division of the renowned French arthouse film distributor that built its reputation on the films of Truffaut, Kislovsky, and Chaplin. The deal also extends to Europe. The film stars and is directed by Baron Ryan, a TikTok and Instagram content creator with millions of followers, and was co-written by digital content creator Caroline Grossman.
Three movies. One weekend. One scheme.
The most significant stories being created today aren't film school graduates. They're people coming from the stage.
I represent one such storyteller. As an M&A and entertainment industry consultant at Creator Camp, an Austin-based film collective that produced and distributed the film "Two Sleepy Men"« , I sat across the table from mk2 CEO Elisha Karmitz at the Cannes Film Festival last month to discuss this very deal. In this article, I want to explain what changed, why it changed, and why no one in traditional Hollywood was prepared for it.
The Quiet Takeover of Cannes
By all accounts, the 2026 Cannes Film Festival was a quiet affair. Film studios sent sparse delegations. The celebrity presence was slim. Every traditional producer I spoke to ended the conversation with the same question: "Are you going to the Cannes Lions Festival in June?"«
Lions is a marketing conference. A branding conference. A conference that everyone who used to buy films at the festival now flies to.
But behind the apparent silence, something else was happening. For the first time in the 78-year history of the Cannes Film Festival, a special summit for content creators was taking place. It was scheduled for half a day. It took place outdoors, on a stage on the sand, in an open-air tent overlooking the Mediterranean Sea. There wasn't enough space. By most accounts, including mine, it was the most attended summit of the entire festival.
On one of those panels sat Markiplier, a YouTube content creator whose self-financed, produced, and distributed horror film «Iron Lung »" has grossed over $50 million worldwide and will begin streaming on YouTube on May 31st. He sat next to Elisha Karmitz from mk2 and Angela Curtin from YouTube. The conversation wasn't about whether content creators should appear on screen. It was about how to get more of them there faster and more effectively.
This is a completely different conversation than the one that was happening in the industry even twelve months ago.
Why was Elisha Karmitz right before everyone else?
To understand how cinema got to this point, you have to understand those who were paying attention to it before it became obvious.
Elisha Karmitz has served as CEO of mk2 since 2005. His father, Marin Karmitz, founded the company in 1974 as a distributor of European arthouse films. mk2's catalog includes Kislovsky's late films, a trilogy that includes «"Three colors: blue, white, red"» , as well as films from the Chaplin archive. mk2 isn't a company that hands out its screens to just anyone. It's a curator of films.
In 2023, mk2 launched YouTube Ciné-Club par mk2—an initiative Elisha had publicly supported since its inception. This label promotes self-produced films for theatrical release. At the time, this move was perceived as somewhat curious. A press release appeared in industry publications. Some film industry representatives reacted with bewilderment.
Three years later, YouTube Ciné-Club has sold over 500,000 tickets across Europe. The documentary was released Kaizen French YouTuber Inoxtag's video about his Everest climb sold 370,000 tickets with 1,000 views in one day. mk2 then partnered with Markiplier on the European release of his film,« Iron Lung"» in February 2026. And now - "« Two Sleepy People» .
I had the chance to speak with Elisha at Cannes. One of his lines particularly stuck in my mind. In an interview with Deadline, he said, "For the last 150 years, cinema has been a place where people gathered to enjoy stories and connect. Now, YouTube is a place where fans gather. So we wanted to build these bridges to keep cinema relevant and bring audiences to cinemas.".
He said the role of mk2 has always been to reimagine the cinema experience for its era. The 500,000 tickets sold at Ciné-Club prove that young audiences want to see films. The problem was never them. The problem was that the film industry stopped making films for them.
INVERSION INSIDE A24
What happened on A24 this weekend is another version of the same story.
A24 isn't a company focused on the creator economy. It's the most respected independent studio of the last decade. Its catalog includes movies like "Everything, Everywhere, and at Once"« , «"Heredity"» , «"Civil war"» . Her brand is one of sophistication, design, and understatement. Behind the Scenes was co-financed and produced by Peter Chernin's North Road Company, a global production studio comprising Chernin Entertainment and its newly formed North Road Films label. Producer Corey Adelson, who heads North Road Films, brought Kane Parsons and the script to A24.
Until this weekend, the biggest box office haul in A24 history belonged to Alex Garland, a former London-based screenwriter who has made one of the most respected directorial transitions of his generation.
A24's biggest opening this weekend was a project from a 20-year-old creator whose project began as a viral creepypasta web series uploaded to YouTube.
Kane Parsons didn't start his career at festivals. He didn't go to graduate school. He created a horror project on YouTube, where it garnered hundreds of millions of views, and it was so successful that A24 acquired the rights, cast Chiwetel Ejiofor and Renate Raineswe in the lead roles, and allowed Parsons to make his feature-length directorial debut.
The opening weekend isn't just a record. It's a structural statement. The path to A24's highest-grossing debuts ever lay not on festivals, but on YouTube.
Curry Barker, the writer and director of "Obsession," has also received a similar assignment. A24 has already signed him to direct the reboot. «The Texas Chainsaw Massacre »" Blumhouse and Focus Features invited him to direct and star in the film. «Anything but ghosts» along with Aaron Paul and Bryce Dallas Howard. Three years ago, he was a sketch comedian on YouTube.
The audience these films are targeting isn't the same audience studios were chasing with their multi-million dollar blockbusters. It's younger, more loyal, and more attached to the creators whose names they already know. During the opening weekend of "Behind the Scenes," 86 percent of viewers were under 35, 66 percent were under 25, and 44 percent were under 21. These are the very same viewers Hollywood has been telling itself for a decade that they don't go to movie theaters anymore. But this weekend, they showed up.
THE INNER WORK PROBLEM THAT HOLLYWOOD STILL HAS NOT SOLVE.
When you spend eighteen years in Hollywood doing mergers and acquisitions, as I did, the studio environment looks like a system that's very good at handling one kind of risk and very bad at another.
Film studios are adept at managing financial risks within established formats. They know how to evaluate a sequel, how to predict the success of a franchise, and how to balance marketing expenses with predicted opening weekend box office returns. What they lack is the ability to manage the risk associated with changing audience preferences.
I've spent the last three years representing content creators on the other side of that wall. This work has shown me something studios are still struggling to understand: the most popular creators don't need traditional distribution channels to reach their audiences. They already have. They need partners who can help them turn that audience into a profitable business.
mk2 realized this in 2023. A24 realized this in 2025 when they greenlit Behind the Scenes. Major studios are realizing this now, in real time, during the opening weekend, which they didn't expect.
The films released this weekend are no exception. They represent the leading edge of structural change.
WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?
The next eighteen months will be very different from the last eighteen.
The deals I'm currently working on aren't deals I specifically sought out. They're deals that content creators approached me with this quarter. Three active business sales are in the pipeline. Five YouTube businesses are being restructured for sale within twelve to twenty-four months. Raising capital to build a creator-led portfolio of projects. All of this is coming from potential clients.
The work isn't just about signing contracts. It's about restructuring, project financing, and negotiations leading up to the sale of the parent company. I'm currently in rooms where executives at major companies are discussing how to partner with creator-led companies, how to invest in their projects, and how to build next-generation studios alongside them, not around them.
What the founders say during these calls, in their own words, is essentially the same proposition: "We want to be ready when the buyer comes.".
After this weekend, a buyer will appear faster than any of us expected.
Tyler Chou is an entertainment and M&A lawyer representing content creators in the creative industries. She is the founder of the law firm Tyler Chou Law for Creators and CreatorArq. In 2023, she left Hollywood after eighteen years in the studio system and currently advises content creators on exits, capital raising, and strategic restructuring. She is based in Los Angeles.
This article was originally published on Forbes.com.